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Linfield Christian High School quarterback Alex Ruiz works on his rehabilitation. Ruiz has decided to amputate his leg after an injury suffered on the football field in October.
(File photo by Frank Bellino, contributing photographer)

The Super Bowl-winning quarterback surprised Ruiz with a prosthetic leg from the San Diego-based Challenged Athletes Foundation at the Del Mar event involving the Football ‘N’ America flag football league that he co-founded. The two even tossed a football back and forth.

“That was the most nervous pass I have ever made,” Ruiz said Thursday, May 17.

The surprise came nearly three months after the amputation, which Ruiz decided on after being told he would live with a limp and need to wear a boot for the rest of his life if he kept the injured leg.

Alex Ruiz said he began to put it all together when someone from the foundation asked him why he wore No. 9 — the same number as Brees.

A few seconds later, Brees emerged with the prosthetic leg and asked the teen what he was going to do with it.

“I didn’t know what to say,” Alex Ruiz said.

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Shirley Ruiz said her son froze.

“Alex couldn’t even answer him,” she said.

Alex Ruiz, who hopes to play competitive sports — including football — with his new leg, said Brees told him he was proud of what he had done.

“He’s an elite NFL quarterback and guaranteed first-ballot Hall of Famer,” Ruiz said. “Knowing that he has my back and seeing that he wants me back on the field — that just motivates me even more.”

Peter Harsch, a San Diego-based prosthetist who will fit Ruiz with his new legs, was instrumental in making it possible for Brees to present the gift.

A while ago, Harsch mentioned Alex Ruiz’s story to the Challenged Athletes Foundation. A foundation representative, Harsch said, ended up speaking to Brees. That led to a plan for Brees to give Alex Ruiz the leg during halftime of a flag football game.

Attempts to reach the foundation by phone and email were unsuccessful Thursday.

Harsch remembers when Alex Ruiz learned of the surprise.

“He could not believe that his longtime hero was there to help him along the way of his journey back to football,” Harsch said.

Brees also agreed to help pay for the new prosthetics, Harsch said.

“Drew went and basically covered the technology that insurance companies do not cover,” Harsch said.

Harsch is holding onto the prosthetic leg and planning to make modifications before fitting it for Alex Ruiz.

He said Alex Ruiz has kept his head up throughout the ordeal.

“What amazes me about Alex is that he’s very positive and he always has a smile on his face,” he said.

The Del Mar event marked the first time Alex Ruiz met Brees, but it’s not the first time he had heard from the NFL superstar.

While Alex Ruiz was in the hospital after his injury, Brees heard about what happened and mailed him a signed Saints jersey.

The jersey, along with a few Brees quotes, hang in his bedroom.

Shirley Ruiz said the past few months of seeing her son lose a leg and chat with NFL players have been “surreal.”

“There are doors that are opening for him that no one ever saw coming,” she said.

Shane Newell joined The Press-Enterprise in October 2017. He covers Canyon Lake, Corona, Lake Elsinore, Temecula, Murrieta and Wildomar. He was a community reporter covering Aliso Viejo and Laguna Niguel for the Orange County Register from September 2016 to September 2017. He graduated from Stanford University in 2016 with a master's degree in communication. He earned his bachelor's in journalism from Long Beach State in 2015. Among his favorite stories were his 2016 feature on Monday Morning Quarterback's Peter King and his life as one of the nation's most prolific NFL reporters and a 2017 look at the Riverside roots of Dodgers catcher Austin Barnes.